Archive for March 5th, 2010

vafo Is the next iTunes challenger iLike-_478

March 5th, 2010

The new store will debut as a beta version and will feature songs from at least three of the four top major recording companies, according to the sources. On Tuesday, iLike changed the name of its Facebook app to “Music.”

Is the next iTunes challenger iLike?

iLike CEO Ali Partovi was not immediately available to comment.

Partovi on the ad-supported model: “I think the jury is out as to whether ad-supported music consumption will work. However, I think it’s important to remember that there’s much more to music. At iLike, we’ve built a self-sustaining ad-supported business (positive cash flow over the past 8-month period), and that’s with only one full-time ad sales person.”

Greg Sandoval covers media and digital entertainment for CNET News. He is a former reporter for The Washington Post and the Los Angeles Times. E-mail Greg, or follow him on Twitter at http://twitter.com/sandoCNET.

Facebook most’s popular music application comes from iLike, and soon the company will try to turn that social-networking cachet into song sales.

This is a strange time for ad-supported music services, and iLike’s foray into downloads comes as skepticism about the business model is higher than ever. Earlier this year, Ruckus shut its doors and Imeem, which is also testing a download store, faced a financial crisis before securing a round of funding and better licensing terms from the big recording companies.

Partovi on downloads: “Everybody in our business is talking to the major labels almost continuously (about downloads),Paul Smith Wallet, and for good reason. The licensing landscape has evolved a lot, and it continues to evolve. If and when a deal is available that can offer an even better experience to our users at reasonable costs to us, we’ll always be interested. I can’t discuss any specific negotiations, product ideas, or rumors.”

A CNET examination of SpiralFrog, the first ad-supported download site, which went out of business in March, indicates that advertisers just aren’t willing to pay these sites premium rates. Music listeners, as it turns out, don’t want to stare at ads when they’re listening to songs.

Updated at 10 p.m. to correct spelling of iLike CEO Ali Partovi’s name.

Others have tried this tact, including Microsoft, MTV, and Wal-Mart and all have ended up either scurrying away or scratching out a living by servicing a niche market. By all appearances, Apple continues to be an unstoppable force in music.

As the ad-supported music sites cast about for ways to generate revenue, some of them are turning to selling downloads. This means they hope they can entice iTunes users, which represents the vast majority of the digital music market,discount ugg boots, away from Apple.

Nonetheless, Partovi impresses me as someone who’s not afraid of a fight. Last week, I interviewed him via e-mail and while we didn’t agree on many of the questions surrounding the ad-supported model, there’s no doubt in my mind he thinks he has it figured out.

Seattle-based iLike, a social music service,mbt sport shoes, is expected to launch a music download store in coming days, perhaps as soon as Thursday, according to two sources with knowledge of the deal. Last month, CNET News reported that iLike was in talks with the top four recording companies about securing licenses for downloads.

“What’s our secret? It’s simple: we’re not trying to help consumers get unlimited music without paying for it. Instead, we’re focused on music discovery: we deliver all the other things that music consumers love without risking a lawsuit or paying high royalties. Besides sampling music, people use iLike to get concert notifications, recommend new bands to friends, see video messages or tweets from their favorite artists–all of which has built iLike an audience of more than 120 million uniques per month across all our apps and widgets while maintaining very low costs.”

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mgvx Isohunt judge says MPAA has yet to prove dire

March 5th, 2010

Some of the cases that have gone against BitTorrent or file-sharing sites Sweden-based BitTorrent search engines, The Pirate Bay, was brought up on criminal misconduct charges and TorrentSpy’s case was decided on a discovery sanction. Some of the issues in the Usenet.com case closely resemble Isohunt and TorrentSpy’s, although the company is not a BitTorrent tracker or search engine.

The Motion Picture Association of America asked a federal court to rule that Isohunt was liable for copyright violations committed by its users, but the judge in the case was unconvinced. In his order, U.S. District Court Judge Stephen Wilson said the studios had yet to prove that the Isohunt’s users had broken U.S. law.

Usenet.com is a company that enabled users to access the Usenet network and it too lost on a discovery sanction.

“United States copyright laws do not reach acts of infringement that take place entirely abroad,” Wilson, wrote in his order.

(Credit:Greg Sandoval/CNET News)

Lawyers for the MPAA, the trade group representing the six major Hollywood film studios,ugg boots cheap, are trying to convince the judge that Isohunt encouraged and contributed to the infringing activity of users. Wilson gave the MPAA until Sept. 15 to file a brief that convinces him direct infringement at the site was committed by those in the U.S. Apparently, Wilson has questions about whether U.S. residents have pirated content using Isohunt.

Isohunt judge says MPAA has yet to prove direct infringment

Ira Rothken, Isohunt's attorney

“Our view is that it would be difficult if not impossible,” Rothken said, “to be able to trace any direct infringement to the users of the Isohunt’s site in a manner that would hold Isohunt responsible for the infringing conduct. I think the judge’s order will hopefully demonstrate to the court that Isohunt,ugg boots sale, besides lacking knowledge of direct infringement, can’t possibly be held liable for users conduct, especially since any such conduct occurs after they leave the site.”

“I believe the difference is that for one reason or another courts seem to place greater social importance on the Google search engine,” Rothken said. “Courts also tend to frown on search engines created to find specific file types like .torrent files. And other than that there is no difference (Isohunt and Google).”

File-sharing sites haven’t had a great year, especially in court, but on Wednesday they received a smidgen of good news.

Rothken is hoping to argue Isohunt’s case before a jury, something that no other BitTorrent sites have managed to do.

Most of these companies claim to do nothing more than help people locate files. One question often asked by readers is how is this different than what Google offers? One can find plenty of infringing content using the behemoth search engine.

A spokeswoman for the MPAA did not immediately have a response.

The significance of the judge’s order, at least from the point of view of Ira Rothken, Isohunt’s attorney,ugg sale, is that MPAA’s investigators have struggled to draw specific examples of infringement occurring in the U.S.

“I believe there has not been a single case in U.S. law where there has been a decision on the merits of a Torrent search engine,” Rothken said. “We’re cautiously optimistic Judge Wilson will deny plaintiff’s motion for summary judgment and ultimately there will be a trial on the merits.”

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7esk Iran hangs first two post-election ‘rioters’_

March 5th, 2010

Zamani was among scores of people arrested in the mass demonstrations after the election, but Rahmani Pour’s lawyer, Nasrin Sotoudeh, denied her client had anything to do with the post-poll riots.

The two men hanged “belonged to the monarchist group Tondar (the Kingdom Assembly of Iran). During their trials they confessed to obtaining explosives and planning to assassinate officials,” he said.

“Mohammad Reza Ali Zamani and Arash Rahmani Pour, whose cases were confirmed by a Tehran appeals court, were hanged on Thursday morning,” ISNA news agency said, quoting a statement from the Tehran prosecutor’s office.

Tehran says the death penalty is necessary to maintain public security and that sentences are carried out only after exhaustive judicial proceedings.

They were the first reported hangings of people tried after the wave of protest that broke out following the re-election last June 12 of hardline President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to a second four-year term.

Iran hangs first two post-election 'rioters'

January 29, 2010 – 3:34AM

Iran on Thursday hanged two men convicted of being Mohareb (enemies of God), in the first executions of dissidents since protests over the disputed presidential poll in June, news reports said.

Tehran prosecutor Abbas Jafari Dolatabadi confirmed the hanging to state-run television.

According to officials, 36 people were killed during the riots last June, but the opposition puts the toll at 72. The Ashura unrest a month ago resulted in eight deaths and hundreds more people wounded across Iran.

The pair were also charged with plotting to topple the Islamic regime, the agency added.

Amnesty International condemned what it termed the “shocking” executions.

“These men were first unfairly convicted and now they have been unjustly killed. It is not even clear they had links to this group as their ‘confessions’ appear to have been made under duress.”

Sotoudeh said she had been prevented from representing Rahmani Pour at what she called his “show trial” in July, and added that many of the charges related to when he was a minor.

Dolatabadi said that out of the nine, “five were arrested on Ashura… they have been tried in two sessions, and they are now waiting for their final verdicts from the appeals court.”

“They objected to the preliminary sentencing, but the appeals court upheld the verdict and they were hanged today,” Dolatabadi added.

Murder, rape, armed robbery, drug trafficking and adultery are all punishable by death in the Islamic republic.

The prosecutor’s office said nine other detained protesters have been condemned to death after facing charges of being Mohareb, trying to topple the regime and belonging to the outlawed main opposition group, the People’s Mujahedeen, and the Kingdom Assembly.

“These shocking executions show that the Iranian authorities will stop at nothing to stamp out the peaceful protests that persist since the election,” it said in a statement.

“The other four were arrested before the Ashura incidents. They are also awaiting the verdict of the appeals court,” Dolatabadi said.

Official figures show that more than 1,000 protesters were arrested in the most recent wave of opposition demonstrations on December 27 during the Shiite mourning rituals of Ashura.

It feared that “these executions are just the beginning of a wave of executions of those tried on similar vaguely worded charges.”

“He confessed because of threats against his family,” she said, adding that she was shocked at the news of the executions because both she and her client’s family had been waiting for word from the appeals court.

The authorities in Iran arrested an estimated 4,000 people including journalists and reformist politicians in a massive crackdown in the weeks following the presidential election.

Stiff jail terms have been handed down to several people convicted of taking part in the unrest, although some have been released on bail pending possible appeals.

“He was arrested in Farvardin (the Iranian month covering March-April) before the election and charged with cooperation with the Kingdom Assembly,” Sotoudeh told AFP.

The latest hangings bring to at least 12 the number of people executed in Iran so far in 2010, according to an AFP count based on news reports. Last year at least 270 people were hanged.

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8edu Iran vows to pursue uranium enrichment_328

March 5th, 2010

Iran’s chief nuclear negotiator Saeed Jalili, meanwhile, will travel to Moscow on Tuesday for talks with Russian President Dmitry Medvedev and Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, according to ISNA news agency.

Enriched uranium of 20 per cent purity is used as fuel to power nuclear reactors and Iran needs it for its internationally monitored Tehran facility.

Earlier this week, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Moscow does “regret” Iran’s refusal to accept the UN-brokered fuel plan.

President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad hinted on Sunday that Tehran would itself pursue uranium enrichment to higher levels if the West spurns its offer of a phased fuel swap, promising Iranians “sweet” news soon.

“All the work is going as scheduled. The tests are a success. This year will be the year of the launch of Bushehr,” he was quoted as saying by the Interfax news agency.

US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, amid increasing international frustration with Tehran, has vowed Washington “will not be waited out” and “not back down” in the face of Iranian defiance.

On Thursday, Russian atomic energy chief Sergei Kiriyenko said the Bushehr plant would start up this year.

Iran vows to pursue uranium enrichment

JAY DESHMUKH January 25, 2010

AFP

“Iran has given a chance to Western countries,” he was quoted as saying by Fars news agency when asked by reporters about Iran’s deadline to world powers over the controversial nuclear fuel deal.

Iranian officials, however, have offered a counter-proposal of a phased fuel swap and Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki gave the West an end-January deadline to accept the Iranian plan.

“Therefore, during the 10 days of dawn (February 1 to 11) we will announce good news regarding the production of 20 per cent enriched fuel in our country,” he said of the period marking the 1979 Islamic revolution.

“This news is so sweet that it will make any Iranian and any freedom-loving person in the world happy. This news is about Iran’s scientific advancement,” Fars quoted Ahmadinejad as saying.

The UN atomic watchdog has offered a proposal that sees the bulk of Iran’s low-enriched uranium of 3.5 per cent purity being sent to Russia and France in one batch for further enrichment to 20 per cent and then returned as fuel for a Tehran research reactor.

“There is no reason for Westerners to pressurise us… and if they want to impose new sanctions, then the Iranian nation will not give up its (nuclear) right,” Haddad Adel was quoted by state television website as saying.

He noted that the UN Security Council had the capacity to “study further measures on Iran” but did not come out explicitly in support of further sanctions.

“Acting with a logic of punishing Iran… is not a sober approach,” he said.

Western powers have indicated that Iran has effectively rejected the UN-brokered proposal put forward in Vienna talks hosted by the International Atomic Energy Agency, the UN’s nuclear watchdog.

The West suspect Iran wants enriched uranium, despite three sets of UN sanctions, so that it can make atomic weapons. Tehran says its nuclear program is aimed solely at generating electricity.

But Mottaki insists Iran has not rejected “the principle” of the nuclear fuel deal.

Ahmadinejad said Iran will make an announcement regarding the enrichment of uranium to 20 per cent purity when the nation next month marks the 31st anniversary of the Islamic revolution which toppled the US-backed shah.

Moscow has long been a nuclear partner of Tehran and has built Iran’s first nuclear power plant in the southern port city of Bushehr but it is still to be operational.

World powers led by Washington are against Iran enriching uranium as it can also be used to make the fissile core of a nuclear bomb.

In recent months Medvedev has indicated that Moscow could back fresh sanctions against Iran over its controversial nuclear program.

Gholam Ali Haddad Adel, an influential Iranian lawmaker with close ties to supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, reiterated on Sunday that Tehran will not give up its right to nuclear technology.

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jjsj Irex prepping new wireless e-book reader_639

March 5th, 2010

8.1-inch display3G wireless connectivity (no carrier announced)Touch screen with stylus navigationFall 2009 release

Hunkered down in New York City, Executive Editor David Carnoy covers the gamut of gadgets and writes his Fully Equipped column, which carries the tag line “The electronics you lust for.” He’s also the author of “Knife Music,” a novel. E-mail David. Follow David on Twitter.

At this point, it’s unclear what the optimal display size will be for e-readers but some people do want screens larger than 6 inches. However, a lot of people think the Kindle DX, which sports a 9.7-inch screen, is too large. So 8.1 inches may be the happy medium.

Irex prepping new wireless e-book reader

Just got an image of a mock-up for a new e-Reader from Irex that’s due out this holiday season. Not much info on this thing but it’s larger than the Kindle 2 and just-announced Sony Readers.

Here’s the little we know:

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Until now Irex, one of the early e-reader pioneers (you remember the iLiad, right?), has mainly offered more business-oriented readers that are rather pricey and sold primarily to European customers. However, this model is a consumer model that will be sold in the U.S., as well as other countries (here in the States, I suspect it will cost less than $400 and possibly less than $350). Allegedly, the unit will have a tie-in with one of the large online e-book sellers, though Irex wouldn’t say which one.

Sony, too, is also rumored to have a larger form factor wireless Reader in the works. We hope to hear about the Sony device in the next few weeks.

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zftt iPod-toting geek, er, Greek gods_282

March 5th, 2010

“In Greek mythology Pan is supposed to dance to his flute in the woods,” Reeder told CNET News. “In my sculpture he’s still dancing but it’s to an iPod.”

iPod-toting geek, er, Greek gods

If Leonardo da Vinci or Michelangelo were alive today, they would incorporate into their work the major symbols of our time and culture, says San Francisco artist Adam Reeder.

“I just sold Sleeping Gamer,” he says, “to one of the Gears of War (video game creators).”

(Credit:Greg Sandoval/CNET Networks)

“Technology has changed the context but not the nature of humans or art,” Reeder said. “Classical sculpture is typically very serious and everyday people come in and they’re kind of ready to be bored. Then, they see this and say ‘Dude, this is great.’ That is because this is going right from me to people who like technology. Instead of art buffs, I want it to be geek to geek. This is our world.”

Reeder acknowledges that he’s also having some fun with the classics. One sculpture depicts the god Zeus “calling down the thunder” only instead of a lightning bolt, he’s calling with aniPhone.

Yeah? Art in the classical tradition is all about glorifying the gods and the human form. Would Michelangelo’s “David” wear earbuds?

He’s convinced that his art will appeal to tech tastes in Northern California.

Reeder’s work is on display through August 31 at Academy of Art University’s 79 Gallery in San Francisco.

Still, the artist makes a point of noting that when it comes to the sculpting he’s dead serious. He does all the work himself, from the hiring of models down to the bronze casting. He said that because he sculpts fast he can do a life-size piece in about 50 hours (see a video of Reeder sculpting). He charges from $40,000 to $80,000 for an original life-size sculpture. A portrait bust in bronze goes for between $4,000 and $5,000.

According to Reeder, who is also a big tech enthusiast, those symbols would definitely include theiPod.

Reeder also created a satyr who has passed out, but not after a night a night of Bacchanalian partying. In the character’s bronze hand is a video game controller. The artist calls it “Sleeping Gamer.”

“Why not?” asks Reeder. The 33-year-old, who recently graduated with a master’s in sculpture from San Francisco’s Academy of Art University, has attempted to wed classical sculpture with modern themes.

Atlas balances an iPod on his shoulders. Adam Reeder's artwork is on display at Academy of Art University’s 79 Gallery in San Francisco.

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yxza Iran vows to pursue uranium enrichment_328